In a Z-World
by Art n' Music
Summary: For three years, the plague walks tirelessly in this world with very little survivors. Danielle thinks she's the only one left, but a meeting with another survivor in need of someone caring sends her through the trials of a family, and the world.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1: All Alone in Hell**

New York City. A town full of life and lights, a city that never sleeps. But not anymore. Now, the streets are desolate apart from some old cars and garbage. Doors creak ajar everywhere in town. Dried blood and withered guts stain the walls of the buildings and rotted bodies could be found along with the entrails. No living soul is in the abandoned city or anywhere near. Except for one.

A sixteen year old girl walks down the road with alert blue eyes. The stale air blows her ponytailed black hair as she searches for supplies in the barren stores. Strapped around her black and green shirt are a shotgun and rifle, extra ammo packs, two pistols and a knife secured around her blue shorts, and a high-tech scope that covers her right eye.

A crash signals the girl, known as Danielle, and she grabs a pistol and turns to the right, but only finds a trashcan lid wobbling. She holsters the gun and continues her hunt, walking to a convenience store. Her boots stomp loudly on the tile floor and Danielle drops her duffel bag she brought with and starts putting food and drinks in it, grabbing some cash as well. The teen shoulders her bag when she hears something out of the ordinary. Shuffling and heavy breathing. She grabs her pistol again and turns to the entrance to find a man shuffling by. He seems ordinary, except for his limp and some blood on his hands. He turns his head to reveal a gaunt face with sunken eyes and blood all over his mouth. His whole body is dead gray and Danielle notices an injury that should've been fatal.

The teen puts her gun away and instead unsheathe her knife. The man moans and raises his arms, shuffling faster to the girl. She calmly walks up to the man and says, "I hope you're in a better place," before stabbing his head. The man falls when she takes her blade out. Danielle grabs some nearby napkins to wipe the dark goo off her blade, then throws the dirty wipes away. She then walks back through town to where she her home is: A large warehouse at the edge of the city near the Atlantic Ocean. Surrounding the building is fence with barbwire on the top and modified with six-inch spikes all over the fence. Danielle carefully opens the gate and strolls inside, locking it back up behind. When she reaches the doors, the teen types on a keypad and deactivates her tight, fly-can't-get-past security, and walks in. Inside, you would think it's a regular living room with a couch and chairs, tables, a small kitchen area, TV, bookshelves full of books, rugs, and shelves full of movies. The difference is the walls are hardened metal and a variety of artillery are placed everywhere.

Danielle reactivates her security system then walks to the couch, placing her guns on the side of the couch. She rubs her scrawny face; feeling tired already when it's only the afternoon. The teen looks over her hands and spots her diary on the table. She picks the black journal and a pencil then opens to a blank page. "Z-Day 21, month 5, year 3. August 19, 2009. Today's my birthday. After all that's happened, I'm surprised I remember. Things outside isn't looking any better. Today seemed to be peaceful though. I went to gather more supplies and only met up with one. I quickly terminated it.

"There still aren't any survivors around, but I'm not surprised. I'm sure to have found one by now, but this place is getting dull. I wish Danny was here. He always found a way to lift my spirits. But I haven't heard of him since the Apocalypse started. I'm gonna send another message later and see if someone will pick up. Wish me luck. And happy birthday to me." She ends her passage with a drawing of a cake and sets the book down back on the table. The teen gets up and, feeling sleepy, takes the cushions off the couch and unfolds her bed. After checking the security and ghost shield are active, Danielle grabs a pillow and blanket and collapse on the bed, making a creaking sound. Before she falls asleep, the teen remembers something and gets back up. She clasps her hands together, and starts praying for safety, for a friend, and for a miracle.

When she's done, Danielle lies back down and closes her eyes for a restless sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2: Ghostly Visitor**

Danielle awakes suddenly from her sleep. The teen quickly checks where she is and gratefully sighs. "Oh. Just a dream." She pants. _It was so vivid but, why can't I remember any of it?_

She lies back down and try to recollect her latest dream. She starts to get something but with the low hum of AC and fridge, the tick of her clocks, and the purr of the ghost shield, she quickly forgot. _Man. Oh well. Time for the usual._

She gets up and checks the time only to find its only late afternoon. "Oh great. I'm gonna be up all night." She gets up and walks to the mini kitchen for a light snack. When the teen's done, Dani grabs a box-like machine with a satellite and a two-way radio on it, and walks upstairs to the roof. The teen takes the wires out and starts tinkering around with them and the radio until they're both connected with expertise. She turns the satellite on, widens the perimeter area, and raises the radio. "Hello? This is Danielle Fenton, a survivor. I am living at the edge of New York City nearby the Atlantic Ocean. If there are any other survivors out there, please call back." Danielle turns the radio off and waits awhile for a reply. She tries again, then a third time before ending the transmission. "Why do I bother?" She takes out some binoculars and looks all over New York lands, but like the transmission, no one is around. Just the usual strays of walking dead.

"If I don't find any living soul around here soon, I'm going to snap. How do people in the movies live like this?"

Before walking back into the safe warehouse, Danielle turns to the undisturbed water full of mysteries, and the yacht.

When she found the abandoned warehouse, the teen also discovered the motorized yacht and searched through it for survivors. There was no one inside. Not even a zombie, which made Danielle suspicious. But the clone did find months worth of gasoline for all three engines and tons of food. But most of them were spoiled from the long years of unused. She did find canned and packaged food to last about three months and plenty of juice and water as well as a few soda jugs and sparkling water. There are lots of first-class beds, a large kitchen, gym and pool, a fancy captain's quarter, an empty library, there was even a game room. Whoever owned this luxury yacht, they must have been one rich family. What Dani doesn't understand is why a yacht is docked by a supply warehouse. Probably to resupply before living out in sea. Smart, but the supplies looked untouched for a few years. There's dust on every surface of the yacht. In the dining room, there were bowls of freezing soup on the table that looks like it hasn't been touched. The most mysterious thing was there was no sign of a struggle. No overturned furniture, no punctures anywhere, there isn't even any blood. It was like the family just disappeared without a trace. That scared Danielle more than a zombies attack.

But besides all that, the boat is in excellent condition and all is ready for transport just in case. Every year, Danielle checks the boat and cleans it up, since she doesn't have anything better to do in the dead world. She also spray painted it to a black and white color scheme, much like her ghost suit. The teen would've just lived in the yacht but one; there could be survivors on land, two; she recently found out that zombies can survive underwater, and three; the warehouse offers more protection from unusual attacks. But in case of emergencies, it rocks restfully in the docks.

Danielle takes one more sweep of the land before walking back inside her home. She crashes on the couch and grabs the blu-ray controller, switching on Pirates of the Caribbean. The teen was at the part where the borrowed ship falls off the edge of the Earth when she gets bored. She rubs her eyes and murmurs, "I never should have wished for something new to happen." She couldn't take it anymore. The teen gets up and starts getting her armaments that are scattered around. After placing her headset, she scans through the many books, selecting the third book of the series 'Heroes of Olympus', and grabs her iPhone and blanket before leaving the warehouse. Danielle puts a delay on the security before walking past the gates and heads back into the damned city. The crisp, morning air blows her raven hair around. She sniffs the air and finds that the wind has turned for the better. Fresh, clean air replaced the scent of blood and burning dead flesh. One of the rarest days in the Apocalypse. So something's going to happen. Whether bad or good, she doesn't know yet.

She walks into one of the many skyscrapers and heads to the top roof of the building using an elevator. The elevator stopped working when chaos ensured, but the teen fixed it using some ecto-technology she 'found' so she was able to use it with her ecto-signature as the key.

The elevator stops at the top floor and Danielle takes the stairs to the pebbled roof. She lays the blanket in the middle of the roof and puts in her headphones to listen to her music, then tries to read her book. But her mind's not in it. Instead, the survivor is thinking of her cousin, Danny. She's never heard of him ever since the Disasteroid incident, which was about three years ago and that's only been a quick reunion. Danielle hopes she'll see him again, dreary from the war probably, but still be him. If her information's right, he and his friend Sam are in a relationship so the teen might be seeing more of her. And she remembers Tucker being elected for something, maybe the mayor, so she wonders how he's doing.

The teen lies down on the blanket and tries to get back in her book, but her eyes slowly droop from the soft-tuned music, the slow breezes of fresh air, and the softness on her back. She tries to keep herself awake but it proves futile when she loses consciousness…

* * *

_Everything is garbled. Danielle tries to see through the distorted image, but all she got are bright flashes everywhere. There wasn't even a sound anywhere. She was able to make out one person, who's in the middle of what looks like a fight. "Danny!" the teen shouts._

_The ghost boy doesn't seem to have heard her. She calls again with no avail when the scene suddenly sharpens. Danielle gasps because in front of her are waves and waves of zombies with Danny in the middle of it. He blasts the undead to oblivion but they just keep stumbling closer to him. "Danny! No!" She tries to run to help, but something holds her back. The teen looks behind her and sees a large ghost wearing frightening clothing. He smiles and Danielle shivers to her boots at the sight of his fangs. She would've guessed he's Vlad, but this ghost is much larger and much scarier. "Oh no, child. No interfering."_

"_Who are you?" she asks, completely terrified._

"_You'll find out soon, child. Now watch this magnificent show."_

_Danielle turns back to see her cousin fly out of the swarm. From the sky, he continues to fire at the undead while shouting something. The clone looks around on the ground and sees a small army firing at the oncoming zombies. She tries to help them, but the ghost pulls her back again. "Let me go, ghost!"_

_The first zombie got through the assault and grabs an unlucky soldier. His scream of pain and fright pierces right through Danielle's mind. She scowls and turns to the large ghost, who still has his large hand on her shoulder, and focuses on her ghost energy. But something's wrong. She can't seem to find the energy. "What the…?" _

"_Like I said before. No interfering." Through all of this, he still smiles. "Now let's go watch my favorite part." The ghost grabs her arm and takes her into the air, where they can have a better view of the battle. The zombies continue to devour the innocent soldiers with no remorse and what looks like the commander is ordering a retreat. In the skies, Danny flies at high speed as a special group of zombies soar after him. Ghost zombies. The ghost boy turns around and blasts the zombies but gets attacked from behind. The two crash on the roof below Danielle. After a struggle, Danny grabs a nearby broken pipe and stabs the wrecked end through the ghosts head. He pushes the corpse off the edge of the roof and looks down to see his men losing. Suddenly, noise rushes around her and Danielle was deaf for a short time. Soon, she could hear the moans and screams, and she can also hear her cousin. "C'mon Phantom. Think. Where's the source of all of this?"_

"_Why don't you look behind you, child?" calls a voice that sounds the same as the ghost with Danielle. Danny pales and slowly turns around. His eyes flash fear for a second then to pure rage. "You! How'd you get out?"_

"_You won't need to know that, child." A dark hand shoots out and grabs the ghost boy around the waist. He fires into the shadow but misses, and the hidden person throws Danny past the clone. She turns and sees that her cousin crashed into a pipe. He struggles to get up when a red ray blasts him to the edge of the roof. The world's hero lifts his head and asks, "What do you want now?"_

"_My revenge."_

"_Well sorry, but you won't get any from me. Now it's time to send you back to where you came!" He flies at the shadowed man, charging his ecto-beam, when suddenly something flashes and the ghost boy gasps, his whole body freezing. Both he and Danielle look down and the girl gasps, seeing a blade sticking out of her cousin's chest, dark green blood dripping out. The blade is pulled out and more blood pours out of the injury and starts dripping from Danny's mouth. Danielle could sense that the attacker is smiling as he watches the life shrink to nothing. "Looks like I do, child." The attacker grabs Danny again and heads to the edge, whispering, "Now let all those who look up to you for hope watch as you are slowly devoured by my creatures. So long, Danny Phantom." And with a maniacal laugh, the man drops Danny and he falls straight into the horde of undead. Danielle hears a shout from the ground and runs up to see a black-haired girl rushing into the onslaught. The scenery suddenly garbles again and clears later. The teen girl looks back down and finds that dead zombie corpses are littered everywhere, surrounding a small clearing where two people are. Danielle quickly heads down to see what's going on. On the ground in front of the clone is Sam on her knees, who's leaning over a not-moving Phantom. The blood has stopped flowing out and the teen could see tears running down the Goth's face. Tears start to build up in Danielle's eyes and she keeps reminding herself it's just a dream. But it couldn't stop the waterworks running down her face. Soon, it was all too much for Sam to take in, and she screams into the heavens. Soldiers run in to see what happened and stop when they see their hero dead. "No…" the commander murmurs. A soldier runs up to him and says, "The general wants a report on the battle. What should I tell him?"_

"_Tell him we have won the battle. And tell him to…have a funeral ready."_

"_Why would we-" he finally hears the cries and turns to find the hero dead. "Oh. Oh no."_

_Danielle turns around and sees the ghost smiling. "This can't be real." _

"_Just wait, child. For this was only the beginning." He swipes a hand and knocks the girl into a building, waking her up._

* * *

Danielle gets up and rubs her eyes, her mind still a little distorted. She suddenly becomes high alert and grabs her gun, checking her area for undead. After seeing its clear, the teen sighs and says, "Idiot. I could've gotten myself killed." She wraps the blanket up and shoulders her backpack before walking back into the elevator. At the bottom, Danielle notices its twilight. She hurries to her home before any unwanted visitors come out of their hiding hole. After slamming the metal door, the teen sighs and slides on the door, saying, "It was just a dream. It couldn't have been real. And yet, it felt real. Ugh, the Apocalypse is making me think crazy now." She clears her head of the haunting nightmare, but the ghost that was in it still intrigues her, as well as frightens her. "I hope I never have to meet him," she mumbles.

When the teen gets her breath back, a blue wisp of cold air blows out of her mouth, making the girl freeze. As slowly as she can, Danielle grabs a nearby shotgun and scans the warehouse for the unwanted visitor. The whole place is dark and limits the girl's vision. The teen tries to find the light switch nearby when something inside clangs. She flinches to the noise with a raised gun and sees something flash in the darkness. After loading a bullet into the barrel, the survivor slowly walks to the kitchen area, grabbing a flashlight on a nearby end table. Danielle takes silent, steady breaths, finger on trigger, ready to take out the most-likely zombie. When the teen's only a few inches from the kitchen, she switches the flashlight on and aims her gun at the intruder, who in turn points his glowing weapon at me. Danielle thought it was weird since a zombie can't hold a gun.

The intruder appears to be a robot with armor on. A ray gun sits on his outstretched arm, pointed at her. On top of his head is a green Mohawk that's on fire with the same goatee.

No one lowers their weapon. They continue to stare at each other, examining which is more superior. After a while, the robot says in a deep voice, "You look familiar."

"How? I haven't seen you before in my life."

The glowing green eyes widens a little when the girl talked. Slowly, he lowers his gun and Danielle lowers hers with confusion.

"Who are you?" he asks.

"Danielle. You?"

"I'm Skulker. Ghost Zone's greatest hunter."

"A ghost, huh? Then how'd you get past the ghost shield?"

Grabbing an orange, he says, "What ghost shield? All I did was phase into darkness without any force."

"What?" Her ocean-blue eyes widen and she screams, "Crap!" before running to the generator.

"I would wait until I leave, Danielle." Skulker says. "I won't be staying long."

She halts and turns around to the ghost. "Why are you here in the first place?"

"I was flying around, looking for some target practice, when I noticed that a warehouse had unusual amount of security guns outside for being abandoned. So I decided to take a look to see if anyone lived here. Though I don't know why here of all places."

"Warehouses are pretty tough against stupid undead," Danielle says matter-of-factly. "Now, if we're done here, please leave."

"Hold your horses, girl. I need a break from all that flying around. We ghosts get tired too, you know."

After a groan escapes her mouth, the female survivor starts walking to the couch when a question from Skulker shocks her. "Why aren't you with the other survivors?"

She freezes on the spot and turns around with curiosity and shocked eyes. "Other survivors? There are more people out there?"

"Of course. I must've passed over their fortress like a dozen times."

"Where?" she asks earnestly moving her face near the hunter's, giving the hunter an alarm.

"Uh, somewhere in Colorado?"

_Colorado,_ the survivor repeats in her mind. She moves her head away and slowly walks back. Her sphere of hope grows larger as the girl thinks more of their actually being more survivors instead of her. "But I've been trying to get contact other survivors for three years. How come they never got my message?"

"It could be many things actually. Maybe you're transmission radius isn't large enough or maybe their communication is down. I don't know."

Danielle rubs her chin as she starts fashioning a travel plan. _If I'm gonna get there fast, I need to pack light. I'll need enough food for three to six days of travelling unless I find a suitable ride. I'll need to map out the safest route so to avoid large cities and any other populated areas. I'll also need to bring enough ammunition for my armaments. _

"Hello?" Skulker calls. "Earth to weird girl?"

"What?" she asks.

"You kinda fazed out there."

"Oh. I was making a plan."

After shrugging his shoulders, the robot hunter says, "Alright, I'm outta here." He flies up to the roof but Danielle quickly stops him by saying, "Wait! Have you heard of Danny Phantom?"

He turns and repeats, "Heard of him? He's been my target since he got his powers."

"Uh, okay? But have you heard of him recently?"

After a small pause, the robot says, "No, I haven't. Not since three years ago," and phases through the ceiling. Danielle turns on the ghost shield and walks to her couch bed, thinking again of the dream. _Not since three years ago. The battle looks like it was in its early stages; a few months or a year. The two are connected, I'm sure of it. What if the dream was real? What if…No. Don't think like that. Danny is alive. He was able to defeat all the ghosts in Amity Park and Vlad Plasmius, even save the entire world from the Disasteriod. He's probably staying low for a while. Yeah, that's it. _

The clone looks around at her home, seeing guns and ammo littered everywhere with a book or movie here and there. She puts her chin in her hand and thinks, _If there are other survivors in Colorado, then maybe I should head over there. The more survivors the merrier, they say. I should start packing now._


End file.
